"it should purge the armies of well-paid generalists, who are incapable of making a single decision without first sending a cheque to McKinsey or Deloitte" - computerweekly.com/opinion/The-UK… ... music to my ears, by @paul_shetler
I would, of course, refine it slightly ... by hiring more civill servants / front line staff and focusing the purging on consultants and the use of consultants.
If you really want to change the system, what you need more than anything else is ... challenge.
I cannot emphasise enough the importance of spend control and the process of pre and post mortem.
But challenge requires transparency, a willingness to accept risk ...
I cannot emphasise enough the importance of spend control and the process of pre and post mortem.
But challenge requires transparency, a willingness to accept risk ...
... it also needs people to move away from dogma e.g. outsource all or agile all or the market knows best.
We have very capable civil servants and I've seen how hiring more and getting rid of consultants can have significant benefits and cost reductions ...
We have very capable civil servants and I've seen how hiring more and getting rid of consultants can have significant benefits and cost reductions ...
... so whilst I agree with @paul_shetler on the revolutionary zeal in his article ... the focus should be on creating a stronger civil service. Part of the problem of the outsourcing dogma is it weakened the skillset to challenge the contracts and what was being done.
I saw this first hand in 2009 / 2010. Entire engineering groups with no engineering experience just project managers for contracts.
They lacked the skills to challenge what was being done, what was being suggested. This was a fault of dogma, an excessive focus on outsourcing.
They lacked the skills to challenge what was being done, what was being suggested. This was a fault of dogma, an excessive focus on outsourcing.
And before we get political, obviously this was happening under Labour (a continuation of what went before) ... it's what I tried to change in my part in better for less. A focus on challenge meaning we also had to develop those capabilities again, we need spend control ...
... so don't be quick to just point the finger at the civil service. It's a victim of dogma, past political actions, the focus on outsourcing, the agile everything (just as bad). Yes it needs reform but mostly it needs strengthening. That will only come through challenge ...
... oh, and getting rid of bucketloads of consultants. How much did the NHS spend on management consultants last year ... the figures are usually eye watering.
Still, that said ... the usual form is for the new intake to complain that everything is broken and they've come up with the new dogma that'll fix everything if they only get rid of the vestiges of the last lot. It does wonders to kill off transparency, challenge and performance.
At some point, in the future, we will get a Government that will go ... we're going to strengthen the civil service by introducing more challenge and getting rid of one size fits all dogma ... probably not in my lifetime but it's good to dream.
